"Prison Break" Hiatus Update

As we reported on Wednesday, FOX has decided to cut the "Prison Break" hiatus short and bring the show back as early as January, following the premieres of 'American Idol' and '24' (December is normally filled with reruns and sports programming) instead of the original plan to copy last year's schedule and bring it back in March. There may however be some obstacles.

Sarah Wayne Callies who plays Sara Tancredi on the show was quoted by TV Guide today that if this really is the plan (the network has not released any official statements regarding "Prison Break's" revised on-air schedule as yet), they may have to start filming the episodes live as they are pretty close to the wire. So, how substantial are those obstacles?

US television dramas are normally filmed two months before their air-date and one episode normally takes ten days to complete (this may of course vary given the production quality). This is why occasional pre-emptions are necessary to keep the production ahead of the broadcast schedule.


Assuming the next two episodes scheduled for November have already been completed (the first of those two airs in 3 days) the crew can of course immediately start working on the new episodes which would air in January. That means that may have been a slight exaggeration on the part of Ms. Callies.

But, the question is whether or not the creative team behind the series has finished the writing of the scripts and has a clear picture of where the show is headed in the coming weeks. Any pressure on the writers who had thought they had more time to develop the upcoming storylines may result in visible drop in quality.

There have been exceptions. The people behind ABC's "Lost" had written the amazing two-hour second season finale in the first week of May 2006 and basically had only two weeks to shoot the episode and complete all post-production work before it aired on May 24.

Keep checking "Televisionista.Net" for more updates on "Prison Break".

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